Literary Spaces

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Literary Spaces

Introduction to Comparative Black Literature

Christel N. TempleAssociate Professor of Africana Studies

University of Maryland, Baltimore County

Carolina Academic PressDurham, North Carolina

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Copyright © 2007Christel N. TempleAll Rights Reserved

Library of Congress Cataloging-in-Publication Data

Temple, Christel N.Literary spaces : introduction to comparative Black literature / by Christel

N. Temple.p. cm.

Includes bibliographical references and index.ISBN 978-0-89089-564-1 (alk. paper)

1. Literature--Black authors--History and criticism. I. Title.

PN841.T46 2007809'.8896--dc22

2007021684

Carolina Academic Press700 Kent Street

Durham, North Carolina 27701Telephone (919) 489-7486

Fax (919) 493-5668www.cap-press.com

Printed in the United States of America

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Dedicated to

Mr. Robert Dent, Jr.

April 8, 1931–September 11, 2005

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Contents

Acknowledgments xiiiIntroduction xvSpecial Note xixPermissions xxi

Chapter 1 The History of Comparative Black Literature 3The Scholarly Debate on Comparative Black Literature 5

Chapter 2 Comparative Analysis and Writing 43The Art of Comparative Writing 43Categories of Comparative Black Literature 44Comparative Black Literature and the Black Studies

Enterprise 48Suggestions for African-Centered Literary Analysis 50Conclusion: Black versus African 52

Chapter 3 Nationalism, Pan-Africanism, and Identity 55from Desirada

Maryse Condé (Guadeloupe) 56A Song for the Parade

Chudi Uwazurike (Nigeria) 75The Woman from America

Bessie Head (South Africa) 85from Song of Lawino & Song of Ocol

Okot p’Bitek (Uganda) 88from Passing

Nella Larsen (USA) 104from Autobiography of An Ex-Coloured Man

James Weldon Johnson (USA) 121

vii

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Meta-ScoreLepê Correia (Brazil) 123

The Mighty Three! Marcus Garvey (Jamaica/USA) 124

Chapter 4 Gender Contexts and Complementarity 125Man of All Work

Richard Wright (USA) 126Your Handsome Captain

Simone Schwarz-Bart (Guadeloupe) 157from The Fisher King

Paule Marshall (USA/Barbados) 172from Woman at Point Zero

Nawal El Saadawi (Egypt) 180Everything Counts

Ama Ata Aidoo (Ghana) 186Girl

Jamaica Kincaid (Antigua) 191Althea from Prison

Dolores Kendrick (USA) 192

Chapter 5 History, Justice, and Politics 195from The Tragedy of King Christophe: A Play

Aimé Césaire (Martinique) 198Prologue from Pastrana’s Last River

Nelson Estupiñán Bass (Ecuador) 210Nineteen Thirty-Seven

Edwidge Danticat (Haiti/USA) 233from The Spook Who Sat by the Door

Sam Greenlee (USA) 241Liberia: Its Struggles and Its Promises

Hon. Hilary Teague (Liberia) 247Ndzeli in Passage

Dolores Kendrick (USA) 251Let me say it

Dennis Brutus (South Africa) 254My African Friend

Paulo Colino (Brazil) 255

viii Contents

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Revenge Marcus Garvey (Jamaica/USA) 257

We Wear the Mask Paul Laurence Dunbar (USA) 258

Chapter 6 Black Cultural Mythology 261In the Spirit of Butler, Unionize! Mobilize! Educate! Democratize!

Maurice Bishop (Grenada) 263Prologue from Dreamer: A Novel

Charles Johnson (USA) 276Toussaint L’Ouverture and the Haytian Revolutions

James McCune Smith (USA) 281Bicentennial Blues

Gil Scott-Heron (USA) 288For Chief

Dennis Brutus (South Africa) 293Nanny: A Poem for Voices

Marguerite Curtin (Jamaica) 296Fairy Tales for a Black Northeast

Lepê Correia (Brazil) 303George S. Schuyler Again

Marcus Garvey (Jamaica/USA) 303Were U There When They Crucified My Lord

Laini Mataka (USA) 304George

Laini Mataka (USA) 307freedom’s divas should always be luv’d

Laini Mataka (USA) 308

Chapter 7 Autobiography and Personal Narrative 311Nadine

recorded by Rebecca Carroll (Haiti/USA) 313from All God’s Children Need Traveling Shoes

Maya Angelou (USA) 318from The Pillar of Salt

Albert Memmi (Tunisia) 330from Here I Stand

Paul Robeson (USA) 337

Contents ix

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from Soul to Soul: A Black Russian Jewish Woman’s Search for Her Roots Yelena Khanga (Russia) 353

from Aké: The Years of ChildhoodWole Soyinka (Nigeria) 363

Chapter 8 Community, Folk Culture, and Socioeconomic Realism 383The Lesson

Toni Cade Bambara (USA) 384from Xala

Ousmane Sembene (Senegal) 390Village People

Bessie Head (South Africa/Botswana) 409Prologue from Love

Toni Morrison (USA) 420George and the Bicycle Pump

Earl Lovelace (Trinidad) 425Carnival

Paulo Colina (Brazil) 433Solstice

Leda Martins (Brazil) 433The Son of Oxalá Who Was Named Money

Mestre Didi (Brazil) 434Billy Green Is Dead

Gil Scott-Heron (USA) 435

Chapter 9 Speculation, Spirituality, and the Supernatural 437from The Palm-Wine Drinkard: And His Dead Palm-Wine

Tapster in the Dead’s TownAmos Tutuola (Nigeria) 439

from The Rape of ShaviBuchi Emecheta (Nigeria) 444

from Midnight RobberNalo Hopkinson (Jamaica/Guyana/Trinidad/Canada) 454

Act One, Scene One from Joe Turner’s Come and GoneAugust Wilson (USA) 474

from Black No More: A Novel George Samuel Schuyler (USA) 496

x Contents

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from Brother ManRoger Mais (Jamaica) 514

The Harvard Law School Forum of March 24, 1961Malcolm X (USA) 527

from Parable of the Talents Octavia Butler (USA) 538

Space Shuttle Gil Scott-Heron (USA) 543

Horoscope John Pepper Clark (Nigeria) 545

Chapter 10 Influence, Adaptation, and Structure 547from Emergency Exit

Clarence Major (USA) 551Act I from Pantomime from Remembrance & Pantomime:

Two Plays Derek Walcott (St. Lucia/Trinidad) 561

“museum guide” from Black Girl in Paris Shay Youngblood (USA) 588

Nice: A MonologueMustapha Matura (Trinidad/Britain) 600

‘Shakespeare winged this way using other powers’Dennis Brutus (South Africa) 610

Leah: In Freedom Delores Kendricks (USA) 610

Appendix Sample Questions for Comparative Literary Analysis 615

About the Author 623

Index 625

Contents xi

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xiii

Acknowledgments

The Creator orders my steps and places special individuals along my pathat perfect moments in time to help bring forth a special harvest. This col-lection of African writings is a tribute to the many — in the past, present,and future— whose lives, words, deeds, visions, and gifts have bloomed inmy favor.

I offer my sincere gratitude to Nana Amanyi I, Abawkumahene, of AgonaSwedru & Adonten Division of Agona Nyakrom Traditional Area, Ghana, alsoknown humbly as Dr. Willie B. Lamousé-Smith, whose rich knowledge of thehuman spirit and potential encouraged me to pursue this project. A wise men-tor, friend, and special guardian, Dr. Lamousé-Smith has helped me balancemy academic journey.

I thank the Department of Africana Studies at the University of Maryland,Baltimore County (UMBC), for being a wonderful center of support, wherethe leadership maintains a healthy environment enabling the natural balancebetween sowing and reaping. Dr. Thomas N. Robinson, Jr., is a departmentchair from heaven: he leads with kindness and understanding in his efforts toreward hard work. I am also grateful for the administrative prowess of Mrs.Wanda S. Nottingham, who joined our department in the middle of this proj-ect and provided tremendous support for all my research. I also thank Dr.Jonathan Peters for introducing me to many African world writers, some ofwhom are represented in this collection.

I thank Dr. Miriam DeCosta-Willis for building my literary foundation inmy early academic years and for offering unlimited feedback, support, andencouragement ever since. Her groundbreaking work in African literatures ofSouth and Central America led me to include in this volume translations ofworks in the Spanish and Portuguese languages. I am also grateful beyondwords for her help in introducing me to Dr. Ian I. Smart of Howard Univer-sity and to the pioneering work of the Afro-Hispanic Institute. I thank Dr.Smart and his wife Juanita both for their understanding my difficulty in ob-taining permission to reprint one of the works in this collection and for theirhelp in having that most elusive request granted.

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xiv Acknowledgments

I offer a heartfelt thanks to Dr. Molefi K.Asante, his wife Ana Yenenga, theAssociation of Nubian and Kemetic Culture (ANKH), and the Cheikh AntaDiop Conference for continued professional support and for frequent oppor-tunities to engage in meaningful intellectual dialogue. I also thank Dr. MarkChristian and Dr. James Naazir Conyers for their friendship and their men-toring. I appreciate their visions for the ongoing development of the disciplinein both domestic and international contexts and their support for my pio-neering literary pursuits. I also thank Dr. Floyd W. Hayes III and the Centerfor Africana Studies at the Johns Hopkins University for providing me withthe opportunity to develop and refine my ideas with some of their best stu-dents. I am also grateful to my UMBC students from the spring 2006 sectionof Black Women: Cross-Cultural Perspectives for their help with a significantearly stage of proofreading the manuscript.

Several other organizations deserve special mention. I thank the membersof the College Language Association for literary support, grounding, and cri-tique and the National Council for Black Studies for being a home and havenfor innovative, groundbreaking ideas in Africana Studies. In addition, I thankthe Modern Language Association, the International Comparative LiteratureAssociation, and the American Comparative Literature Association for pro-viding ongoing debate about the worth of African world literatures—a debatethat has finally given comparative Black literature uncontested space in theacademy.

As always, I thank Carolina Academic Press — particularly Bob Conrow,Jennifer Whaley, and my copy editor, Lee Titus Elliott—for being the gem ofa publisher that keeps magic happening in the name of Africana Studies.

Finally, I express gratitude to my family and loved ones, who released mefrom many commitments and familial duties during the final year of thisproject.

Christel N. TempleJuly 26, 2006

Columbia, Maryland

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xv

Introduction

At the 1995 annual meeting of the National Council for Black Studies (NCBS),there was a debate on the floor about the direction a Black Studies curriculumshould take in order to reflect an African-centered point of view. When a mem-ber suggested comparative literature as an appropriate discipline for an African-centered study of Black literatures, the suggestion was rejected. A representativefrom the panel explained that the discipline of comparative literature is definedfrom a Eurocentric framework that does not permit Black literatures to be ex-amined in contexts most meaningful to Black cultural readers or to readers seek-ing an African-centered literary experience. While Literary Spaces: Introductionto Comparative Black Literature is not a retort to this definition, it is an attemptto offer a unique framework for a broad comparative study of Black literatures.

The African world has produced an immense body of literature, which re-flects the many literatures and ideas of numerous regions where people ofAfrican descent have engaged with diverse environments and created cultur-ally significant communities. Such communities reflect cultural and social der-ivations of Black experience, as well as adaptations based on interactions withstimuli beyond their African origins. Pan-Africanism, the broad idea of unity,commonality, and cooperation among people who are physically, culturally,consciously, geographically, psychologically, or politically of African descent,is the foundation of this text. The critical areas of inquiry introduced here, aswell as the literatures grouped into the categories implied in the definition ofPan-Africanism above, offer readers and students opportunities to explore thesimilarities and differences among the agents of global African experience.

This volume has several objectives: (1) to be reader-friendly; (2) to offer asimple, common-sense approach to the art of comparison; (3) to introducethe history of comparative Black literature; (4) to present a broad descriptionof the African world through literature; (5) to demonstrate the breadth andvitality of African world literatures, which can support a separate, unique pro-gram of comparative study; and (6) to show that students today have a greateropportunity to learn the literatures of Africa and the Diaspora than earlier cel-ebrated writers (such as Ralph Ellison, Toni Morrison, and Charles Johnson),

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xvi Introduction

1. Quincy Troupe and Rainer Schulte, eds., introduction to Giant Talk: An Anthologyof Third World Writings (New York: Random House, 1975).

who were weaned largely on the richness of white European and Americanclassics and literary traditions. Certainly there is no fault or error that earlierBlack writers studied the white European and American literary classics. Anystudy of literature, regardless of the literature’s cultural origin, is vital forbroadening a reader’s vision of the world.

However, in the discipline of Black Studies (also known as African-Amer-ican Studies, Africana Studies, Afro-American Studies, Diaspora Studies, Pan-African Studies, and Transatlantic Studies), a discipline founded in 1968 toprovide undergraduate and graduate students with immersion programs con-cerning topics relevant to the Black experience, there is enough literature fromAfrica and the Diaspora to comprise an entire course of study. The AfricanAmerican Studies department at the University of Maryland, BaltimoreCounty (UMBC) proved this sufficiency when it offered a track of study inComparative Black Literature in its master’s degree program in African Amer-ican Studies from 1989 to 1995. UMBC offered a pioneer immersion programin literature of the African world in a comparative context, and the programdid not require students to take courses in white American or European liter-ature. The program offered the following courses: Comparative Black Fiction,Comparative Black Drama, Comparative Black Poetry, Black Literary Theory,Black Folklore, Black Intellectual Thought, Search for African Identity, andTopics in Comparative Black Literature (for example, Black Cinema). The pro-gram thus demonstrated that Comparative Black Literature is a sustainablearea of study for a graduate program. The UMBC model is a prototype forthis volume.

Quincy Troupe and Rainier Schulte’s edited collection, Giant Talk: An An-thology of Third World Writings, is also a prototype for Literary Spaces.1 Troupeand Schulte place their text’s selected works into six sections: “Oppression andProtest,” “Violence,” “A Crisis in Identity,” “Music, Language, Rhythm,” “TheHumorous Distance,” “Ritual Magic,” and “The Conceptual Journey.” LiterarySpaces models itself after several ideological foundations of Giant Talk, eventhough Giant Talk examines not only the literatures of Africa and the Dias-pora but also the literatures of the Third World. Their introductory commentsabout the nature of the Black writer are noteworthy:

[I]t should be understood that the Third World writer, like any otherwriter, cannot create out of a vacuum. His starting point is not thecelebration and elaboration of an already existing tradition or cul-

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Introduction xvii

2. Ibid., xxx.3. Ibid., xxv.4. Ibid., xxvi.5. Ibid., xxvii.

ture, but the construction of a new culture as an antibody to a cul-ture that he rejects. His position turns out to be extremely compli-cated, since he does not know what the exact forms of his orientationmight be or should be. He only knows that he is in absolute con-frontation with a culture that tried to form him but failed to do so.The cultural values that he inherited have lost their original support-ive power and have left him in chaos. He must assimilate old formsand create new ones at the same time: that is his danger and his chal-lenge as a moral, intellectual and artistic innovator.2

In describing the dynamics of the International Conference of Negro Writ-ers and Artists held in Paris in 1956 and in Rome in 1959, Troupe and Schulteoffer support for a distinct “Black” comparative literary endeavor:

Richard Wright emphasized that black writers and artists were not“allowed to blend, in a natural and healthy manner, with the cultureand civilization of the West.” They felt that the black experience, theircommon bond, had its own validity and to explore that experiencefully required them to separate themselves from the ideas and tradi-tions of the Western world. One basic and historical situation, racialseparatism, forced them all to start from a similar point: a clash withWestern civilization.3

Troupe and Schulte also suggest that “Third World writers searched fastidi-ously for ways to distinguish their work from the dominant Western culture,and develop the beauty and strength of their culture”4 because there was a fearat the Second International Conference “of succumbing to the sterility of theWestern civilization which has been for the last few centuries basically Euro-pean.”5 By the twenty-first century, with significant communities of Blackwriters in Europe and the Americas, the definition of Western and Europeanliterature has shifted slightly to include a representation of literature by peo-ple of African descent; yet the Black literatures appear largely on the marginsof the literary canon.

Although this volume includes a section “Influence, Adaptation, and Struc-ture,” which highlights Black writing specifically modeled after previously pub-lished works (including those in European literature), writers of Black litera-

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xviii Introduction

6. Ibid., xxvii.7. Alioune Diop, “Opening Address,” Yearbook of Comparative and General Literature

43 (1995): 13–14. (Originally published in Présence Africaine 8, 9, 10 (November 1956):10–18.)

ture, unlike white European and American writers, are not constrained by along and often burdensome tradition. Indeed, according to an analogy byTroupe and Schulte, “[w]hile the German writer may be haunted by Goethe,and the Englishman by Shakespeare, these [Third World] writers felt no suchrestraint, and admitted of no such measuring stick. It is exactly this freshnessand vitality that now attracts the Western world to the literary productions ofthe Third World. The tables have been turned.”6

Inevitably, Alioune Diop’s passion as displayed at the First InternationalCongress of Black Writers and Artists in 1956 is a challenge posed in this vol-ume. For, during the Congress, he encouraged African scholars to “declareand assess together the wealth, the crisis and the promise of our culture . . . re-vealing and offering to the admiration of the world varied and undoubted tal-ents which have hitherto only been kept under a bushel by the concerted si-lence of the colonial powers and racism.”7

With all of these precursors in mind, this volume offers a history of com-parative Black literature, evaluates the role of Black literatures in comparativeliterature programs, and presents the debates, from 1969 to the present, aboutthe placement of African-derived literatures in the universal literary canon.

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xix

Special Note

For artistic purposes, the author has chosen to use the many regional vari-ations in spelling, sentence structure, punctuation, and word usage that arenot considered “standard” English as it is written in the United States. In hav-ing done so, the author encourages the readers of this collection to accept suchvariety—and, more important, to celebrate it.

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xxi

Permissions

The author gratefully acknowledges rights and permissions to use the fol-lowing works:

Chudi Uwazurike, “A Song for the Parade,” in To Tangle with Tarzan and OtherStories (Trenton, NJ: Africa World Press, 1992). © 1992 by ChudiUwazurike. Reprinted by permission of the publisher.

Bessie Head, “The Woman from America,” in Tales of Tenderness and Power(Portsmouth, NH: Heinemann, Inc. 1989). © 1989 by The Estate ofBessie Head.

From Maryse Condé, Desirada (New York: Soho Press, Inc., 2000). © 2000 byMaryse Condé. Reprinted by permission of the publisher.

From Okot p’Bitek, Song of Lawino/Song of Ocol (Portsmouth, NH: Heine-mann, Inc., 1984). © 1984 by Okot p’Bitek. Reprinted by permission ofthe publisher.

From Nella Larson, Passing. © 1929 by Nella Larson.From James Weldon Johnson, The Autobiography of an Ex-Colored Man (New

York: Knopf, 1927). © 1927 by Alfred A. Knopf, Inc. © renewed 1955 byCarl Van Vechten. Reprinted by permission of Alfred A. Knopf, a divisionof Random House, Inc.

Lepe Correira, “Meta-Score,” Callaloo 18, no. 4 (1995): 819. © 1995 by CharlesH. Rowell. Reprinted by permission of The Johns Hopkins UniversityPress, Baltimore.

Marcus Garvey, “The Mighty Three,”“George Schuyler,”“Revenge,” in The Po-etical Works of Marcus Garvey, ed. Tony Martin (Dover, MA: MajorityPress, Inc., 1983). © 1983 by Tony Martin. Reprinted by permission ofthe publisher.

From Richard Wright, “Man of All Work,” Introduction by Paul Gilmore (NewYork: HarperCollins Publishers, Inc., 1989). © 1940 by Richard Wright.© 1961 by Richard Wright. © renewed 1989 by Ellen Wright. Reprintedby permission of the publisher.

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xxii Permissions

Simone Schwarz-Bart, Jessica Harris, and Catherine Temerson. Your Hand-some Captain, Callaloo 40 (1989), 531–543. © 1989 by Charles Rowell.Reprinted with by permission of The Johns Hopkins University Press, Bal-timore.

Paule Marshall, The Fisher King (New York: Scribner’s, 2000). © 2000 by PauleMarshall. Reprinted by permission of Scribner’s, a subsidiary of Simon &Schuster, Inc.

From Nawal Al Saadawi, Woman at Point Zero (London: Zed Books, 1983).© 1983 by Zed Books.

Ama Ata Aidoo, “Everything Counts,” in No Sweetness Here and Other Stories.(New York: The Feminist Press at the City University of New York, 1970),http://www.feministpress.org. © 1970 by Ama Ata Aidoo. Reprinted bypermission of the publisher.

Jamaica Kincaid, “Girl,” in At the Bottom of the River (New York: Farrar, Strausand Giroux, LLC, 1983). © 1983 by Jamaica Kincaid. Reprinted by per-mission of the publisher.

Dolores Kendrick, “Althea from Prison,” “Ndzeli in Passage,” “Leah: in Free-dom” in The Women of Plums. © 1989 by Dolores Kendrick.

Aimé Césaire, The Tragedy of King Christophe (New York: Grove/Atlantic, Inc.,1969). © 1969 by Grove/Atlantic, Inc.

Nelson Estupiñan Bass, prologue to Pastrana’s Last River, trans. Ian L.Smart. © 1993 by Nelson Estupiñan Bass. Reprinted by permission ofIan I. Smart.

Edwidge Danticat, “Nineteen Thirty-Seven,” in Krik! Krak! (New York: SohoPress, Inc., 1995). © 1993, 1995 by Edwidge Danticat. Reprinted by per-mission of the publisher.

From Sam Greenlee, The Spook Who Sat by the Door. © 1969 by Sam Green-lee. Reprinted by permission of Sam Greenlee.

Alice Moore Dunbar, ed., “Liberia: Its Struggles and Its Promises” and “Tou-ssaint L’Ouverture and the Haytian Revolutions,” in Masterpieces of NegroEloquence: 1818–1913. © 1914 by Alice Moore Dunbar.

Dennis Brutus, “Let me say it,”“For Chief,”“Shakespeare winged this way usingother powers,” in A Simple Lust: Collected Poems of South African Jail &Exile including Letters to Martha (Oxford, UK: Heinemann, 1963). © 1963by Dennis Brutus. Reprinted by permission of Dennis Brutus.

Paulo Colina, “My African Friend,” Callaloo 18, no. 4 (1995), 739–740. ©1995 by Charles H. Rowell. Reprinted by permission of The Johns Hop-kins University Press, Baltimore.

Paul Laurence Dunbar, “We Wear the Mask,” in Lyrics of Lowly Life. © 1896by Paul Laurence Dunbar.

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Permissions xxiii

Maurice Bishop, “In the Spirit of Buter, Unionize! Mobilize! Educate! De-mocratize!” (Atlanta: Pathfinder Press, 1982). © 1982 by Maurice Bishop.Reprinted by permission of the publisher.

Charles Johnson, prologue to Dreamer (New York: Scribner’s, 1998). © 1998by Charles Johnson. Reprinted by permission of Scribner’s, a subsidiaryof Simon & Schuster, Inc.

Gil Scott-Heron, “Bicentennial Blues,” “Billy Green is Dead,” “Space Shuttle,”in So Far, So Good (Chicago: Third World Press Inc., 1990). © 1990 byGil Scott-Heron. Reprinted by permission of the publisher.

Marguerite Curtin, “Nanny: A Poem for Voices,” in The Mother of Us All: AHistory of Queen Nanny, Leader of the Windward Jamaican Maroons, KarlaGottlieb (Trenton, NJ: Africa World Press, 2000), 113–119. © 2000 byAfrica World Press. Reprinted by permission of the publisher.

Lepe Correia, “Fairy Tales for a Black Northeast,” Callaloo 18, no. 4 (1995):820. © 1995 by Charles H. Rowell. Reprinted by permission of The JohnsHopkins University Press, Baltimore.

Laini Mataka, “WERE U THERE WHEN THEY CRUCIFIED MY LORD,” inBeing A Strong Black Woman Can Get U Killed. © 2000 by Laini Mataka.

Laini Mataka, “George,” in Never As Strangers. © 1988 by Laini Mataka.Laini Mataka, “freedom’s divas should always be luv’d,” in Restoring the Queen.

© 1994 by Laini Mataka.Rebecca Carroll, “Nadine,” in Sugar in the Raw: Voices of Young Black Girls in

America (New York: Clarkson Potter/Publishers, 1997). © 1997 by Re-becca Carroll. Reprinted by permission of Clarkson Potter/Publishers, adivision of Random House, Inc.

From Maya Angelou, All God’s Children Need Traveling Shoes (New York: Ran-dom House, Inc., 1986). © 1986 by Maya Angelou. Reprinted by per-mission of the publisher.

From Paul Robeson, Here I Stand (Boston: Beacon Press, 1958). © 1958 PaulRobeson. Reprinted by permission of the publisher.

Yelena Khanga, with Susan Jacoby, “Distant World,” in Soul to Soul: A BlackRussian Jewish Woman’s Search for Her Roots (New York: W. W. Norton &Company, Inc., 1992). © 1992 by LDY, Inc. Reprinted by permission ofthe publisher.

From Wole Soyinka, Aké: The Years of Childhood (New York: Random House,Inc., 1981). © 1981 by Wole Soyinka. Reprinted by permission of thepublisher.

From Albert Memmi, The Pillar of Salt (Boston: Beacon Press, 1992). © 1992by Albert Memmi. Reprinted by permission of the publisher.

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xxiv Permissions

Toni Cade Bambara, “The Lesson,” in Gorilla, My Love (New York: RandomHouse, Inc., 1972). © 1972 by Toni Cade Bambara. Reprinted by per-mission of the publisher.

From Sembène Ousmane, Xala (Chicago: Lawrence Hill Books/Chicago Re-view Books, 1976). © 1976 by Sembène Ousmane. Reprinted by permis-sion of the publisher.

Bessie Head, “Village People,” in Tales of Tenderness and Power (Portsmouth,NH: Heinemann, Inc., 1989). © 1989 by The Estate of Bessie Head.

From Toni Morrison, Love (New York: Knopf, 2003). © 2003 by Toni Morri-son. Reprinted by permission of Alfred K. Knopf, a division of RandomHouse, Inc.

Earl Lovelace, “George and the Bicycle Pump,” in A Brief Conversation andOther Stories (London: Heinemann UK, 1988). © 1988 by Earl Lovelace.Reprinted by permission of the publisher.

From Roger Mais, Brother Man (London: Jonathan Cape, 1954). Reprinted bypermission of The Random House Group Limited.

Mustapha Matura, Nice: A Monologue (London: Methuen Drama, 1980). ©1980 by Mustapha Matura. Reprinted by permission of the publisher.

Leda Maria Martins, “Solstice,” Callaloo 18, no. 4 (1995): 871. © 1995 byCharles H. Rowell. Reprinted by permission of The Johns Hopkins Uni-versity Press, Baltimore.

Paulo Colina, “Carnival,” Callaloo 18, no. 4 (1995): 736. © 1995 by CharlesH. Rowell. Reprinted by permission of The Johns Hopkins UniversityPress, Baltimore.

Mestre Didi, “The Son of Oxalá Who Was Named Money,” Callaloo 18, no. 4(1995): 796. © 1995 by Charles H. Rowell. Reprinted by permission ofThe Johns Hopkins University Press, Baltimore.

From Amos Tutuola, The Palm-Wine Drinkard (New York: Grove/Atlantic,Inc.), 7–16. © 1953 by George Braziller. Reprinted by permission of thepublisher.

From Buchi Emecheta, The Rape of Shavi (New York: George Braziller, Inc.,1983), 1–16. © 1983 by Buchi Emecheta. Reprinted by permission of thepublisher.

From Nalo Hopkinson, Midnight Robber (New York, Warner Books, Inc., 2000).© 2000 by Nalo Hopkinson. Reprinted by permission of the publisher.

From August Wilson, Joe Turner’s Come and Gone (New York: Dutton Signet,1988). © 1988 by August Wilson. Reprinted by permission of DuttonSignet, a division of Penguin Group (USA).

From George S. Schuyler, Black No More (New York: Modern Library, Ran-dom House Publishing Group, 1999). © 1931 by George S. Schuyler.

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Permissions xxv

Malcolm X, “The Harvard Law School Forum of March 24, 1961.” Reprintedby permission of The Harvard Law School Forum.

From Octavia Butler, Parable of the Talents. © 1998 by the Estate of OctaviaButler. Reprinted by permission of the Estate of Octavia Butler.

J. P. Clark, “Horoscope,” in A Reed in the Tide (London: Longman, UK, 1965).© 1965 by Longman, UK.

From Clarence Major, Emergency Exit. © 1979 by Clarence Major. Reprintedby permission of Clarence Major.

Derek Walcott, Act One, in Pantomime, in Remembrance & Pantomime: TwoPlays (New York: Farrar, Straus & Giroux, LLC, 1980). © 1980 by DerekWalcott. Reprinted by permission of the publisher.

Shay Youngblood, “Museum Guide,” in Black Girl in Paris (New York: River-head Books, 2000). © 2000 by Shay Youngblood. Reprinted by permis-sion of Riverhead Books, an imprint of Penguin Group (USA).

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